Health Insurance in Rural India

Gandhiji said, “If you want to develop India, you should develop rural people as 80% of the Indian live in Villages”.  Ironically, so far no serious attempt has been made by Govt of India for Rural people as regards health insurance.

 

The scope of Health Insurance in India is very very good.  There is potentiality of more than Rs.40,000 crores of premium in the coming 3 – 4 years but at present only tip of an iceberg is being explored.  The main reasons for non selling of Health insurance policies is non-awareness of the Public and Non-paying capacity of the people at large who are poor.  At present by and large health insurance is a game of rich people.

 

Almost all the villages in India are lying untapped from health insurance point of view.  There are some rich landlords residing in villages who can afford to pay sufficient premium but they are not being contacted/made aware of health insurance policies.

 

 

By and large, villagers are very sincere and god fearing.  Mahatma Gandhi said, “If you want an honest man, go to a village.  If you want further honest man you should contact an illiterate person”.  Meaning thereby, a villager would never like to cheat anyone or insurance company whereas rich people ever try to manipulate claims.

 

There should be a mandatory condition of 10% of premium or 10% number of total policies issued from villages for all the insurers.  Whosoever does not fulfil this condition, he (insurer) should be penalized and if any insurer does a remarkable premium of villages, he should be suitably rewarded.

 

Sometime due to poor service of the insurer, the insured becomes the sufferer.  In this context carrot & stick policies should be implemented. 90% of rural areas premium is lying untapped as Govt of India has not given a serious thought to this insurance.   Moreover, claims can’t be more than thousands per person.  More so, rural insurance will be a service to the Nation.

 

Mahatma Gandhi said, “If you want to serve India, you should serve the poor rural people”. A study by ASSOCHAM on Rural India says that only 8-10 percent of the rural households are covered under life insurance.  Similar might be the case with non-life insurance.  Sooner this untapped business is explored, better it would be.

 

Insurance Industry should explore rural insurance by innovative and rural – friendly policies as thousands of crores of premium could be harvested from Rural Insurance.  At affordable premium, number of policies should be devised for rural people.  There is sufficient potentiality to go for rural insurance if insurers make tie up arrangement with rural banks (bancassurance).

 

Some policies which are meant for poor people cover pre-existing diseases from inception.  Insurers have devised number of policies to cater to all section of society e.g. for downtrodden to medium people.  Mainly the following policies have been devised by insurance companies (National Insurance):

 

Universal Health Insurance Scheme (floater Sum Insured Rs.30,000/-, covering self + spouse + 3 children).

• Micro Suswasthya Insurance Policy
• Micro Suraksha Insurance Policy
• Jan Arogya Policy (Premium starts from Rs.70/- , covering S I of Rs.5000/-.

 

Insurers should take the following steps:

• All Health Insurance Policies are made public on TV Channel and there should be a “TV Talk” at regular intervals from an  insurer.
• There should be Radio Talks on Health Insurance on various All India Radio Stations.
• There should be special seminar on Health Insurance Policies in Rural areas.
• Awareness Camps should be organized in Rural as well as Urban areas so that ordinary people could come to know that these policies exist.
• There should be meetings in schools and in rural areas and help of Local Panchayats could also be had.
• There should be some special incentives to those who sell maximum Health Insurance Policies.  These incentives could be in  the form of Cash Prizes, Special Appreciation Merit Certificate, Trip to a Foreign Country etc.

 

There should be a special CRM Department to attend to Health Insurance complaints so that immediate justice is given to complainants/their claimants are redressed.

 

I have devised following 2 policies (submitted to National Insurance  H O Kotkata) which if prepared and implemented will go a long way in popularizing Health Insurance as they are meant for poor and down trodden people.

 

BPL WELFARE POLICY:-

APPLICABILITY  :   The Policy will cover any individual BPL (Below Poverty Line) person between age group of 18 to 65 years.

 

BENEFITS AVAILABLE:

Section I  : Hospitalization due to illness/accident up to Rs.10,000/- is covered.  There should be indoor facility but there should not be any condition of 10 beds.

Section 2 : Personal Accident cover for individual up to S I of Rs.25,000/- with following cover

Death                                :        Rs.25,000/-

PTD                                  :        Rs.25,000/-

Loss of two limbs                :      Rs.25,000/-

Loss of one limb or one eye :    Rs.12,500/-

               

There should be no Exclusion of “Pre-existing Disease”.  However, there should be waiting period of 30 days in case of illness.

 

PREMIUM   :    Rs.50/- but there should be no service tax.

 

GRAMIN SEHAT BIMA POLICY:

APPLICABILITY: The policy will cover any person between age group of 18 to 65 years, irrespective of their occupation, income etc.

 

BENEFITS AVAILABLE:

Section I : Hospitalization due to Illness/Accident upto Rs.5000/- is covered.  There should be indoor facility but there should not be any condition of 10 beds.

Section II :  Personal Accident cover for individual up to sum insured of Rs.10,000/- with following cover:

Death                                :               Rs.10,000/-

PTD                                   :               Rs.10,000/-

Loss of two limbs                 :               Rs.10,000/-

Loss of one limb or One eye  :               Rs.10,000/-

                                       

There should be No Exclusion of “Pre-Existing  Disease”.  However, there should be waiting period of 10 days in case of illness.

 

PREMIUM : Rs.50/- but there should be no service tax.

 

The above two policies, if implemented, can go a long way in popularizing Insurance Industry which will make Health Insurance a profitable segment too.

 

The more base of Health Insurance widens the more profitable it will become.  There is every reason that Health Insurance will flourish like anything.  Only thing is we require WILL & Positive Thinking.

 

 

By: Nician (K K MITTAL), DEPUTY MANAGER &, DP-CUM-PRINCIPAL (RTC), NATIONAL INS.CO.LTD., REGIONAL OFFICE-I, CHANDIGARH, Published in “The Insurance Times”November, 2012